The two of them ran, boots slapping against wet stone, the tunnels ahead of them howling with echoes of pain and war.

Maeve was half a step behind him, her lantern swinging wildly, but they were going full speed ahead, because the screaming had grown clearer. Grunts, wet slashes, and the cracks of something brittle snapping bounced off the curved tunnel walls.

To all of that, Gael only had one thing to say.

"Those screams are too realistic to be Nightspawn pretending to be humans," he muttered, vaulting over a rusted pipe that'd burst out of the floor like a bone growth.

Another corner. Another ladder. A leaky shaft where the walls sweat with slime and heat. Pushing forward without pause, their breaths quickened until—finally—the dark and wet tunnel widened into something massive.

A cavernous chamber opened up before them, and it was impossibly large, sparsely lit by flickering fungal sconces and twitching bio-lamps nailed to rusted pipes. The light was weak and jaundiced, revealing clusters of overgrown vegetation climbing the walls and arching across overhead piping like ivy gone mad. A bronze, tower-like building sat hunched at the chamber's center, squat and hexagonal, and it was scarred with rust and soot like it'd been pulled out of a battlefield and then dumped down here.

But the battle hadn't ended.

People were fighting everywhere.

Gael stopped short at the lip of the tunnel and ducked behind a leaking pipe. Maeve dropped beside him, already squinting through the lowlight.

On one side—scrappy, ducking, masked—were the Gulchers in thick, form-destroying full-body leather suits and heavy-duty gas masks. They hurled makeshift flasks of poison with screeching desperation. Slingshots, smoke bombs, and nail traps littered the ground around them as they scurried between broken pillars and warped grates, laying cover fire with shouts and coughing fits.

On the other side… Repossessors.

Gael's grin slipped slightly.

The surface gangsters' leather patchworks masks were tighter, crueler, their bodies bulging with spider-limbed augments and crude metal armor.

They moved like vultures mid-feast, metal morphing around their arms—rusted swords, claws, hooks—and they slashed through the Gulchers like meat sacks stuffed with glass.

Maeve tensed beside him, and she was already shifting forward when he threw out an arm to hold her back.

"No," he mumbled.

Her head snapped at him with a scowl. "Those small guys are getting slaughtered."

"This isn't our war."

"You said that last time. You're going to say it next time too."

"Because it's true every time."

She didn't look half-convinced, but she didn't argue either. He kept his arm firm. Beneath their feet, the metal hummed with heat and tension.

Because the Gulchers were losing.

Badly.

Two of them fell trying to retreat. A third threw himself forward with a vial in each hand, shouting something that got cut short with a metal blade through his chest. Gael winced. The guy exploded in a puff of noxious mist that made the nearest Repossessor stumble.

A minute later, the full scale retreat began.

A figure on a raised platform at the far end of the chamber—a Gulcher with cracked goggles and a coat thick with stitched patches—raised a rattle sphere above his head. He shook it violently, and the sound, clicks and hollow beads, echoed sharply through the chamber.

And like they'd rehearsed it in prayer, the Gulchers scattered. They broke formation and ran, climbing, ducking, scurrying through pipe mouths and broken gates.

Within thirty seconds, the chamber was emptied of their presence, and their retreat was swallowed by steam and pipe breath.

The Repossessors didn't chase. Too many of them were bleeding. Too many were on the ground groaning, clutching at scorched faces and shredded tendons. The rest were already splitting into groups: triage teams, defense squads, and runners grabbing supplies from a few bronze carts they'd dragged down here with them. Nobody had energy to gloat, and that made Gael feel oddly more at home.

He tapped Maeve on the shoulder.

"... Now we go," he whispered, stepping forward.

She followed.

He walked out of the shadows and spread both arms wide, his lantern swinging from his hips.

"Hello, hello," he said, voice loud and light. "I heard a few eight-armed boys might be bleeding in my general vicinity. Lucky you, I'm running a special on plague-suppressant tinctures and limb-saving miracles today, so how about it? Want a taste?"

Every single Repossessor in the chamber turned. A dozen blades whirled toward them. Hooks reshaped from arms. Blades unfolded from shoulders. A few hissed low and predatory. Someone even pulled a bolt-launcher out of their chest, and Maeve's hands certainly tightened around her umbrella, but Gael only grinned wider and stepped toward the nearest injured man—one lying sprawled on a raised metal walkway above a sewer stream, coughing violently, his chest pulsing with rapid stabs of breath.

Gael dropped to one knee beside him.

The man's chest was blackened. Chemical burns laced his ribs. A broken needle had jabbed through his thigh, and a chunk of metal still glimmered in the wound. Gael clicked his tongue, already reaching into his coat.

"Exorcist. Get the Coagula Red, a cut of the respirator lace, and the long syringe."

She didn't hesitate. She reached into her dress and pulled out the tools, clean and silent, while he worked fast with his first-aid: dabbing, injecting, and wrapping the worst of the man's wounds.

Around them, the Repossessors remained alert, but the edge softened almost immediately as most of them seemed to recognize Gael as the doctor who'd been patching them up for the better part of the past few months.

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Weapons lowered. Not all of them, but enough to make Maeve look less on edge.

So, while Gael worked in silence, footsteps clanged on the metal walkway behind him.

A familiar set of footsteps.

Glancing over his shoulder for a brief moment, he saw Fergal striding into view, stone-faced as ever. His six spider arms were folded behind him like metal wings, while his five goons flanked him.

Maeve's brow creased.

"What is Division Two doing here, Fergal?"

Fergal didn't meet her eye. His reply came low and flat. "It's… a long story."

Gael opened his mouth to make a crack—something about Fergal's definition of 'long' being three words max—but then came another sound.

A hollow thunk.

Everyone in the chamber stilled.

Gael turned his head towards a far and large tunnel just as the sound grew louder. Rhythmic. Measured. It was the end of a staff striking rusted metal with the weight of solid authority behind it.

And there, from the tunnel, the Palm of the Repossessors stepped out of the gloom like a king returning to a ruined throne.

His leather patchwork coat dragged behind him, stained with grease and something darker. A tangle of grimy golden hair fell down his shoulders like dried riverweed. His face was half-hidden—only his jaw covered by a rough-cut leather mask—but it was his golden eyes that caught the chamber's breath.

Four half-masked Repossessors flanked him like bodyguards. The Fingers. And behind them: a flood of about a hundred Repossessors, armed, blood-slick, and dragging supplies.

Lorcawn's boots echoed with each step deeper into the chamber. He passed the dying lamps and curled vines like a prophet through rot. His sawblade staff tapped once more before he came to a full stop on the metal walkway, and his gaze swept the chamber slowly.

He looked at the battered ground, the crumpled bodies, the triage lines forming, the shattered pipework—and then the golden-eyed freak locked eyes with Gael.

The Palm of the Repossessors loomed with all four right hands still wrapped around his sawblade staff, but Gael kept working on the wounded man's ribs, winding a gauze of coagula thread while tilting his head lazily.

"... What a coincidence we meet down here again, Plagueplain Doctor," Lorcawn said.

"Bharncair's tunnels are cozy this time of year," Gael replied with a grin. "Fun or not, a doctor goes where the blood needs staunching."

Lorcawn chuckled softly, and for a brief second, his attention caught on Maeve. Gael didn't miss the gleam in the man's gold eyes—how they dragged along Maeve's arms like a butcher assessing marbling—and Maeve scowled in response to the silent appraisal. She didn't speak, but she was definitely grossed out as she shifted her weight, shoulders stiff and jaw clenched.

Then Lorcawn's gaze wandered off as if bored, sweeping the chamber full of groaning Repossessors. "Can you treat all of them?"

Gael glanced around. There were about forty injured, all of them from Fergal's 'Division Two'. Judging by the groans, the torn muscles, and the blistered skin all baptized in some foul chemical stew… he scratched the side of his head with a scalpel.

"With what's in my coat? Not all." He shrugged. "I can manage maybe half of them. The rest need pulling up to my clinic as soon as possible. Unfortunately, chemical injuries settle fast, so even if they get to my clinic in time, the damage will have fossilized by then—you know, scars, twisted sinews, the works. Permanent stuff. But hey, that's the gangster's life you're living, right?"

Lorcawn tilted his head as he returned the smallest shrug. "It truly is."

Then the Palm raised his left hand.

No words. No gesture beyond that little lift.

And the Fingers moved in response.

Blades unfolded from bone. Limbs snapped out like spider legs. The Four Fingers lunged toward their own injured comrades all around the chamber with their Advanced Jumping Spider Classes, and Maeve inhaled sharply as the executions began. A man barely conscious had his throat skewered before he could speak. Another reached out, trembling, before a Finger's boot crushed his hand and a curved blade tore open his side. Screams echoed for only a few seconds before being replaced by wet silence.

Fergal stiffened beside them. His five goons—usually impassive as statues—tensed like drawn cords as well, but Gael didn't flinch.

Maeve jerked as though she was about to make a move, but he yanked on their ankle chain lightly.

Don't do something stupid, Exorcist.

She turned her glare on him, her jaw clenched tight enough to crack teeth. For his part, Gael didn't meet her eyes—he was too busy wrapping bandages around the shoulder of the man who was still alive and savable.

That was his job.

Not justice.

Not outrage.

Just… salvaging meat from the rot.

And Lorcawn, watching the carnage unfold like a man admiring fireworks, finally turned back towards Gael.

"No need to bring half of them up to your clinic," he said casually. "They'd only slow the others down, and we can't afford to leave the pipes. Not now. We leave, and we'll be giving the Gulchers more time to regroup."

While Maeve still looked like she'd love nothing more than to lob a scalpel at Lorcawn's teeth, the man then offered a casual tilt of the head—as if they were old friends bumping into each other at a garden party instead of a corpse-ridden sewer.

"I'd like to make a contract," he said, voice syrup-slow. "Fate seems fond of bringing us together, Plagueplain Doctor—"

"No thanks," Gael chirped quickly. He didn't even glance up from where he was stitching a gash along the side of a man's neck. "Unfortunately, Juno made me promise I'd stay neutral as a Plagueplain Doctor down here in the pipes, and you of all people should know what it means to shake on a promise with the Rot Merchants."

Lorcawn didn't answer right away. For a second, he looked slightly irritated—one of his golden brows crept upwards—but then he smiled, but only with another one of his eyes.

"Of course," he said lightly. "Wealth above all, and make no lie. Neutrality is a noble thing." Then he took a step closer, letting his staff teeth grind softly against the metal walkway. "How about this, then? I'd like to make a contract not with the 'Plagueplain Doctor', but simply with the 'Doctor'."

That got Gael's attention. He finally looked up.

"Currently, we are tracking a little something through these pipes," Lorcawn continued. "The control chamber. The central one. The Gulchers know where it is. Whoever controls the chamber controls the Gulch Pipelines beneath all of Blightmarch, and with them, access to rejuvenating Gulch water all across the ward."

He spread two hands wide in mock helplessness.

"All I want is your help finding it," he finished. "That is all. Assist Fergal and his Division Two by locating the chamber with your smarts and tricks as a mere doctor, and you will be rewarded with a handsome sum of Marks. What do you say about this job?"

Maeve drew in a sharp breath. "We don't—"

Gael cut in smoothly, voice like a knife through hot butter. "What a coincidence." He clicked his tongue, wiped his fingers on a blood-slick rag, and beamed up at Lorcawn. "How about this: you keep your Marks. All we want is a redirection. Once we help you find this 'central chamber', you'll route a bit of Gulch water through the pipes under our clinic. We also have our own reasons for wanting access to Gulch water."

Lorcawn's eyes gleamed as he extended one of his gloved hands. "That can be easily arranged. Do we have a deal?"

Gael took his hand. Cold. Clammy. He gave it a brisk shake like he was sealing a deal over a dead fish, then turned back to his patient without fanfare.

"Well then," he muttered, "I'd better get to patching up the rest of the rotters before their insides leak into the ductwork. Mind if I'm allowed to focus?"

Lorcawn nodded once. "Of course, doctor." Then, turning, he addressed his soldiers without raising his voice. "Run the escaping Gulchers down. Capture as many as you can before nightfall."

The Fingers didn't wait. They burst into motion like knives flung down a corridor, limbs jerking and skittering as they vanished into the pipes, and the rest of the Repossessors followed behind, a flood of stomping boots and scraping steel.

As they scattered, Lorcawn glanced sideways at Fergal. "Work with the doctor and the Exorcist from now on."

Fergal clenched his jaw.

"... Understood."

With that, Lorcawn turned as well. He walked off without fanfare, sawblade staff scraping in time with each slow, measured step, his patchwork cloak dragging like something dead behind him.

Gael watched the Palm go, his eyes narrowing on the cruel man's back.

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